


A Lovely Shade of Purple

by fredbassett



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-04
Updated: 2019-11-04
Packaged: 2021-01-23 05:41:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21315094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fredbassett/pseuds/fredbassett
Summary: John is in pain and Rodney is not impressed.
Relationships: Rodney McKay/John Sheppard
Comments: 6
Kudos: 70





	A Lovely Shade of Purple

**Author's Note:**

  * For [neevebrody](https://archiveofourown.org/users/neevebrody/gifts).

> Written eight years ago for a birthday present.

If looks could kill, Rodney McKay would have just saved the Wraith a job.

John held up a hand, hoping to stave off a tirade that he knew perfectly well he deserved, and promptly winced at the pain that lanced through his chest.

“Exactly!” Rodney crowed in triumph. “Now perhaps you’ll stop with the ‘I’m fine, thank you very much, of course there’s nothing wrong with me so stop fussing’ act.” The force of his glare ramped up by another few notches.

Laughing would clearly have been inadvisable on more than one level, so John simply did his best to school his features into the blank expression that had served him well during the wide variety of bollockings he’d received in his life.

“And you can stop looking like that as well!”

“Like what, Rodney?”

“Like butter wouldn’t melt in your goddam mouth!” Rodney hesitated and then demanded, “I don’t even know what that stupid phrase means!” He ran a hand over his short hair, looking uncharacteristically vulnerable for a moment. “My grandmother was always saying it… Oh God, I’m turning into my own grandmother!” Another accusing glare was directed at John. “Next time you decide to end it all, Colonel, I’d really rather you chose a time when I’m not anywhere in the vicinity, in fact, preferably choose a time when I’m on another planet… no, scrap that, in another galaxy!”

“Yes, Rodney, I’m sorry, Rodney…”

“No, you’re bloody well not.”

That wasn’t entirely fair, John was actually pretty sorry for the scare he’d given Rodney, but he very much doubted he’d make much headway in a reasoned argument on the subject, so there was only one thing for it....

John let the mask of impassivity drop. He ached from head to foot – being slammed into a wall by someone damn nearly twice his size wasn’t his idea of fun but acting as decoy had been the best idea he’d been able to come up with and at least it had been him hitting the bricks at speed and not Rodney. According to Carson, he’d ended up with at least three cracked ribs and John knew perfectly well that his back and buttocks were already turning an impressive shade of purple. He’d also been kicked in the guts and was lucky not to have a ruptured spleen. On top of that, he had a splitting headache. So, all in all, yes, he certainly deserved the tongue-lashing he was about to get from Rodney but…

“Lie down before you fall down, you bloody idiot.” The interjection broke into John’s thoughts. The words had been sharply spoken, but the concern in Rodney’s eyes gave the lie to his tone. “Has Carson given you any painkillers?”

John nodded. The damn things were already enveloping his mind in a fog, slowing his reactions in a way he hated but was unable to resist. He reached up to unfasten the buttons on his shirt, only to have his hands gently swatted away by Rodney, who now seemed more intent on doing a very passable impression of a mother hen rather than flaying John with his tongue. When John’s shirt slipped to the floor, Rodney sucked in a sharp breath but didn’t speak. He dropped to his knees and started to unlace John’s boots, pulling them off as John steadied himself with one hand on Rodney’s shoulder. John screwed his eyes shut against the sight of Rodney McKay on his knees at his feet. John had dreamed of a moment like that for years, but these weren’t quite the circumstances he’d been hoping for. And now he was going to have to do his best to keep his dick under control, which was almost certainly going to end up being easier said than done…

Fortunately, the last time anyone had undressed John like this had been when he’d fallen out of a tree house as a kid and damn nearly broken his neck. He’d been a mass of bruises for days and his mother had needed to get him ready for bed until he’d been able to bend over again without yelling out in pain… she’d tucked him up every night with his favourite teddy bear, which had been decked out in almost as many bandages as John had been sporting… But at least when his mother had undressed him, John hadn’t had to worry about his body giving him this sort of embarrassing problem.

Rodney’s hands undid John’s belt and made short work of the fastenings of his BDUs. John felt his pants pool around his ankles and was vaguely aware of his underwear following suit. The hiss of Rodney’s indrawn breath was loud in the silence that had enveloped them, but John didn’t think it was the sight of his thankfully still-quiescent cock that had provoked his reaction.

“The last time I saw something that colour was in the Guggenheim,” Rodney commented. “They had an entire wall decorated with purple splodges.”

“You hate modern art. Why were you in the Guggenheim?” As attempts to change the subject went, John knew that one was pretty feeble, but it was the best he could manage whilst feeling like a piece of shit on a particularly heavy shoe.

Rodney waved a hand airily. “I can do culture, Colonel Neanderthal.” His eyes narrowed. “And don’t change the subject.”

John found himself being backed slowly and carefully towards the bed. Even he knew that getting horizontal was going to hurt like hell, but lying on his stomach wasn’t going to be possible, not with cracked ribs, so he’d just have to take it like a man when his arse came into contact with the bed, the arse that, according to Carson, contained the perfect imprint of several bricks. John hadn’t been able to turn his head far enough around to see, so he’d just taken the medic’s world for it, but from the looks he was getting from Rodney, he was pretty sure that his body resembled a modern art exhibit in more ways than one.

“Sorry for the whining, McKay,” he muttered five minutes later when he was finally lying on the bed, propped up in something approaching comfort on a pile of carefully-arranged pillows.

“It was very manly whining,” Rodney offered by way of consolation. He sat down on the side of the bed and brushed John’s hair back from his forehead, his fingers cool against John’s sweat-slick skin. “You look like crap, have I told you that recently?”

“Several times, actually, but hey, who’s counting?” John allowed his eyes to fall shut. The adrenaline rush that had cushioned him from the worst of the pain during the fight had gradually ebbed from his system on the journey back, leaving behind the all-too-familiar feeling of lethargy that had got numerous servicemen and women killed in the aftermath of an action, reaction times and thought processes dulled to such an extent that they were easy meat for the next enemy who cared to press their advantage. The only thing that John seemed to have escaped on this occasion was a post-combat hard-on.

Right on cue, his dick decided it had been well-behaved for long enough. John kept his eyes closed and tried to will his erection under control. It was bad enough having been undressed by the object of his unrequited lust, but he did not want to have the sort of conversation that an inconvenient hard-on was likely to provoke. You couldn’t spend time around other men in the military without knowing about that sort of reaction to life or death situations, but what happened in the communal showers stayed in the communal showers.

As his dick slowly filled, John felt a corresponding flush start to mount his cheeks. He considered activating the ATA gene to lower the temperature on the air conditioning but couldn’t summon the mental energy. In the meantime, his treacherous cock continued its inexorable march to full hardness. John kept his eyes screwed tightly shut, wishing that Rodney would decide he had something more urgent to deal with, like cuddling their newly-acquired ZPM.

John could feel the cool sheet that Rodney had pulled up to his chest shrouding his body like the wrappings on an Egyptian mummy, no doubt perfectly outlining John’s erection. He wondered what his chances were of pretending to have fallen asleep…

To his horror, John felt Rodney slide his hand underneath the sheet and settle it on top of John’s dick. The flush on his cheeks deepened as his cock twitched under Rodney’s fingers, making it perfectly plain that this development met with its entire approval, eve if its owner was now desperately hoping for a full-scale Wraith attack to descend on the city.

“Stop panicking,” Rodney chided gently. “Contrary to popular opinion, I am not actually totally oblivious.”

A moment later a pair of very soft lips pressed themselves against his mouth and Rodney started to run his fingers up and down John’s hard cock. A gasp of surprise was captured by Rodney’s mouth and John’s brain abruptly decided to shut down all higher functions and simply re-boot in safe mode, leaving him free to enjoy the feelings coiling low in his guts. Rodney’s lips worked gently but insistently against his in a kiss that John had never allowed himself to believe would ever become a warm reality rather than just a lonely fantasy.

A few moments later, John’s cock pulsed in Rodney’s hand sending pleasure coursing through every nerve-ending on a successful mission to banish pain.

“Now will you get some sleep?” Rodney sounded half-amused, half-exasperated and very, very pleased with himself.

“Rodney…” John wasn’t quite sure what he’d been going to say next, but Rodney silenced him with another kiss.

“Just shut the fuck up and go to sleep, Sheppard. And yes, I will still be here in the morning.”

Rodney McKay made an unlikely teddy bear, but for once in his life, John was perfectly content to follow orders.


End file.
